shold history books be revised so that our and future generations can learn the real truth?

Question

for example can someone really claim to discover new territory for their country if it is already inhabited?eg. Columbus,imagine if you went to Spain or wherever and decide to plant a flag and claim it as your land while indigenous people were watching you..

Answer 1

Do we know the 'real' truth? Let's follow your analogy. Imagine if you want wherever and decided to plant a flag and claim it as your land while indigenous peoples were watching you. Who is going to write an account of the 'claiming' of this 'new' land. The indigenous peoples, who do not have a system of writing? Or you, as the star of the show.
The problem with re-writing history, or with writing it for that matter, is that it is always written from a particular perspective. If you are the winner, you have one perspective. If you are the loser, you have another. If you are neutral, you have yet another. Trying to go back in the past and find out what 'really' happened is almost impossible, because you have such limited information.
More important than rewriting history books, is to teach our and future generations to have an open mind, and to question what they read. For much too long we have worshipped the printed page, and accepted whatever was on it without question. And today, we are doing the same with television. If you want to see bias in the news, watch BBC or any of the European versions of what's happening in the world today, and compare it with what is presented on North American TV. You'll wonder if you're on the same planet!
Sorry for the rant, but I really think sparking people to think for themselves is more important than rewriting history, especially as we can do nothing to change it.

Answer 2

Your question is loaded from the get go. It assumes first that there is such a thing as truth, second that we can know this truth, third that we can successfully communicate our knowledge to others, and fourth that the communication is worthwhile.

Even if we could somehow unearth enough facts and background of a historical event to get something approaching accuracy, we would have the challenge of trying to find an objective stance between all our sources. This task is almost certainly impossible, since valuations and judgements were as much a part of the lives of our forefathers as they are in our lives and in our interpretations of the past. Your question betrays your values and how you want history to be reinterpreted, but nobody is free from some bias. In fact, it might not even be possible to imagine such a thing as an objective view of history under the most ideal conditions.

Let's take a quick look at Columbus, for the heck of it. At the simplest level, "discovery" seems accurate since Europeans had never been to the Carribean (the Norse never travelled that far south). It was new to them, from their perspective, and since we're almost exclusively the inheritors of a European culture (Britain/France in the US and Canada, Spain in Mexico and Central/South America, Portugal in Brazil, mixed in the Carribean) rather than the various native ones, it makes sense to identify with the European viewpoint. As a new land, not ruled by any recognized authority, it could be legitimately conquered, just as Europeans warred against each other when they didn't recognize each other's legitimacy. The conquest of the new world was simply easier than any European war and no native force was able to resist long enough to prove worthy of European recognition, unlike some other natives in other parts of the world (such as China). Also, since you seem to like relativism, it implies that while another viewpoint might exist, none could be truer than a European power-politics viewpoint, so our current history books are perfectly valid.

Further, the encounter was between an expeditionary force of an extremely sophisticated, militaristic, multicultural, and literate society (Spain/Portugal) and unprepared, relatively unsophisticated, illiterate natives. The only records we have of the enocounter are from Columbus's crew and some archeological evidence. It would be very difficult to disprove these conceptions in order to come up with another story, so we are mostly forced to accept it as is. Columbus's truth is the only truth we have, and if it's imperfect so be it.

Finally, it's probably not worth the effort to rewrite all the history books, especially with "what-if" scenarios like that proposed by you (some Aztec "K'lombux" or something discovering Spain). "What-if" is almost only speculation, not the hard science based on what happened that history tries to be. Further, changing history to fit changing social currents rings ominously of social engineering.

I feel that history books should be left as is. If new findings allow us to shed new light on history, then they should be allowed to, as they do. However politics, even with noble aims (though I'm not claiming your aims are noble), should not enter the equation whenever possible.

Answer 3

Modern Historians have, for a long while, and still continue to seek both sides of the story if you like. The old chestnut about history being written by the winners is no longer a valid argument. Historian's who dare to put forward one sided arguments or shaky theories face the interrogation and counter opinions of many other, very learned academics so as a result, research is extremely detailed and thorough. They are trained to examine documents and root out any bias or hidden agendas contained within.

Maggie makes an excellent and very important point about the way History should be viewed and I will reiterate the point she makes. It is a poor Historian who views the past from our modern point of view. The question to ask when looking at a period in antiquity is, for example, 'what would this event have meant to the people of this particular period?' or 'how would this building have made a contemporary person feel?' You hypothesize and form your conclusions with the help of sound, unbiased evidence from good quality primary sources.

Answer 4

Yes.

Of course, there are always different perspectives on things, but the example you give seems to me to be right. "Discovered" is hardly the right word here. I read a text that said something like "the Indians hadn't legally claimed the land, so the Europeans did" as though it made any sense for Native Americans to file legal claims in European courts.

Ultimately, I think textbooks as such should be done away with, students should read real books, from various perspectives (when appropriate), not books that claim (wrongly) to be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.

Answer 5

History is revised constantly as new books about history are published everyday. If you start researching something, the more you research the more varied the results. "History books" is to general a term as the number of books is vast; language, date of publication, translation, etc. Should history books that are used in schools be changed is a totally different question all together. It would be nice to know the truth but as others have answered it is usually the winners that write the historical facts. How much is true? Your guess is as good as anybody else.

Answer 6

You are assuming the "revisionist" knows the truth. A dangerous assumption.

It is impossible to understand history if one tries to write it in terms of whatever "contemporary" understanding is. The best historians try to get into the mind, the thought processes, the belief systems, the political systems, the social and religious thought of the day, etc. and write it from that standpoint.

It is arrogant to hold the 16th century, for instance, hostage to the way the 21st century sees things. In trying to write history in this way you just wind up with a narrower and more bigoted view, not the "real truth".

Answer 7

Yes, history books definitely need to be rewritten. For example Indians were not savages, they had a written language, they had a congress, they traded, and here we come and we're eager to kill off all the buffalo in hopes of killing them, then if that were not bad enough we gave them blankets that were loaded with small pox's virus, then we took their land and sent them on the mother of all road marches where they died or succumbed to the elements. We took their land and if it had not been for the Indians we would have all died the first winter here. We don't talk enough about Slavery and how horrible it was and we try to sugar coat it. We don't talk about the contributions African Americans have made to this country. We don't talk about how bad the Irish were treated when they arrived in this country. We just leave out big huge chunks of history and it's sad.

Answer 8

No, new history books should reflect what is assumed to be most accurate at the time, that being said, history often is reported using perception which shakes the idea of accuracy. If anything current perceptions of history should reflect past perceptions. After all those percceptions existed and were in fact part of history.

Answer 9

Kids aren't learning the truth?

I want them to learn the truth, but I don't want some ugly spin on it like the one I think you're implying. Just tell what happened. It's history, not propaganda (either positive or negative).

Answer 10

do you think people really want to know the truth....like....hte only real reason Lincoln fought the south was to maintain the tax money made from cotton. Do you think blacks really want to learn that different tribes caught others and sold them to slave traders for whiskey. Wow, that would be like forgetting about all the politically correctness.....I say GO FOR IT.